Blue Jays Hand Manatees Second Straight Defeat

Bucci Starts Tonight For Brevard County

DUNEDIN, FLORIDA – The Brevard County Manatees were one out of way from sending Wednesday night’s game into extra innings, but the Dunedin Blue Jays had other plans as Kevin Pillar’s RBI single handed the ‘Tees their second straight loss as they fell 2-1 at Florida Auto Exchange Stadium.

Franklin Romero Jr. hit his first homer of the season in a game against Dunedin on Wednesday night. (Image courtesy Brevard County Manatees)

With the game tied 1-1 heading into the bottom of the ninth, Greg Holle relieved Brevard County (28-24 second half, 57-63 overall) starter Drew Gagnon. Holle retired Justin Jackson to start the inning but then allowed a one-out walk to Kenny Wilson. Wilson then stole second and Jonathan Jones proceeded to strike out looking for the second out of the frame.

Wilson’s stolen base proved costly to the ‘Tees as Pillar then stepped up and singled to center to bring home Wilson and give Dunedin (27-23, 69-48) their second one-run win of the series against Brevard.

Dunedin got on the board first with a run in the bottom of the third. Marcus Knecht led off the inning with a single to left and then advanced to second on a fielding error from Nick Shaw, which allowed Jon Berti to reach first. Knecht would score two batters later on a RBI groundout off the bat of Wilson.

The one unearned run is all that the Jays would get off of Gagnon (0-2, 3.27) as he had his best outing with Brevard. He went eight strong innings and yielded just four runs. Gagnon did not walk a batter and recorded five strikeouts.

The Manatees tied the game up in the top of the seventh thanks to a two-out solo home run by Franklin Romero Jr., his first of the season. Jason Rogers went 3-for-4 and Reggie Keen added two hits as well in the loss.

Brevard County will look to salvage the series finale against the Blue Jays on Thursday night at 6:35 p.m.

Nick Bucci (1-0, 0.00) will toe the rubber for the ‘Tees. Bucci has recorded 12 strikeouts in nine innings of work over two starts with Brevard.

The Blue Jays will counter with Cody Evans (0-1, 9.00). Evans gave up five runs in three innings of work in his last start against Daytona last Friday.